Railway-car-door construction



sept. 7 192e. 1598,',822

E. F. JAGER RAILWAY CAR DOOR CONSTRUCTION Filed Nov. 12` 1924 2 sheets-sheet 1 g im E. F. JAGER RAILWAY OAR DOOR CONSTRUCTION Sept. 7 ,-19265- 2 'sheets-snaai 2 Patented Sept. 7, 1926.

' UNITED STATES EARL F. JAGER, 0F CHICAGO, ILLINOIS.

RAILWAY-CAR-DOOR CONSTRUCTION.

Application filed November 12, 1924.

This invention relates to the art of doors for freight and express cars, and has reference more particularly to doors of the sliding type which are suspended from a trackway above the door opening and slide lengthwise of the side of the car in opening and closing the door opening.

Railway car doors of this type are commonly equipped on their lower edges with a depending flange that co-operates with upwardly and outwardly projecting guide brackets attached to the sill of the car body, to hold the door from swinging outwardly or away from the side wall of the car under the pressure of the lading or lateral swaying of the car body. These guide brackets project outwardly of the vertical plane of the door opening and are not infrequently broken, bent or otherwise damaged by contact with the lading or trucks backing up to the door opening;

One object of my present invention is to provide improved means for holding the car door against outward swing from the vertical plane of the opening that 'shall be entirely free from the objections above noted inhering in the use of the common outwardly projecting guide brackets. To the attainment of this object, the structure of my present invention is equipped with one or more stationary door guiding and retaining members located inside the vertical plane of the outer edge of the door sill, and the bottom edge of the door is equipped with a co-operating movable guide member that overlaps and lies behind the stationary guiding member, so that the entire door guiding and retaining device is located wholly back of the vertical plane of the outer edge of the door sill, thus eliminating danger of damage thereto from lading or trucks'.

Another object is to provide an improved the known construction above referred to.

Another object is to supply a simple and Serial No. 749,381.

efficient provision for drawing the door snugly against the opening when the door is closed.

Another object is to provide an improved construction whereby the door shall be held against outward pressure at its bottom over its entirewidth. i

Still another object is to provide a construction which shall be theft-.proof against the. possibility of entering the car by raising the doorl over the guiding and lretaining brackets and then swinging it clear of the latter, as it is often done with the ordinary car door- @ther objects and many of the attendant advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following detailed description,

taken in connection with the accompanying drawings wherein I have illustrated one practical embodiment of the principle of the invention, and in which- Fig. l is a fragmentary elevation of the lower portion of the side wall of a freight car containing my improved door and door guiding means;

Fig. 2 is a horizontal section of the same taken on the line 2-2 of Fig. l;

Fig. 3 is a vertical transverse section through the lower portion of the door opening and door, including the floor and channel sill supporting the floor.

Fig. t is a horizontal section on the line lewe of Fig. 3, looking downwardly, with the door in closed position; and

Fig. 5 is a similar section showing the door slid to open position.

Referring to the drawings, 6 designates the channel sill of the car, 7 the floor supported on the sill 6, 8 one of the side walls in which is formed the door opening 9, and l0 the door posts, either metal or wood as preferred, at either side of the opening 9. As clearly shown in Figs. 2 and 3, the floor of the car at the opening overhangs the vertical plane of the side wall 8; this overhanging portion of the fioor constituting the door sillbeing designated by 7. 11 designates the car door supported either from the top or bottom as preferred.

To the outer face of the car sill 6 and the under side of the door sill 7 directly beneath and preferably for the full width of the door opening is a bar 12 herein shown as of angular form, attached through its vertical limb to the sill 6 by rivets 13 and to the under side ofthe door sill 7 by bolts 14C and nuts 15 countersunk in the sill 7 The horizontal limbof the angle bar 12 is formed with a depending flange 16 extend-v ing the full length thereof andconstituting the stationary element of a door-guiding and retaining device forming an important feature of the present invention. It will be observed by reference to Fig. 3 that the guiding andj retaining member 16 lies inwardly of the vertical plane of the outer edge of the door sill 7. Secured to the low- Aer edge ofthe door 11, as by bolts 17, the

rality of shorter bars may be lused instead without detracting from the principles of my invention.

In order that the door, when fully closed, may be held tightly against the .outer faces of the posts l10 and against rattling, the rear face of the flange 16 is formed with a camlike protuberance or bulge 20, near one end thereof, while the flanger 19 carried by and movable with the door, is formed near the other end thereof with a similar cam proltuberance or bulge 21 on its front face. As Y the door is slid to the fully closed position indicated in Figs. 1, 2, and 4, the upstand-` ing flange 19 rides over the bulge20 and at the same time the bulge 21 onthe member 19 rides over the. other end of the ange 16;

the two cam projections or bulges thus cooperating to pull the lower end of the door inwardly and tightly against the outer faces ofthe posts 10, and hold it in such position.

In order to prevent the lower end of the door from swaying outwardly when the Y door is open, I provide on the sill 6 one or i vG() more of guiding andgretaining devices 22, shown in Figs. 1, 2 and' 5. These may conveniently take the forni of short sections structurally similar to the anglebar 12 with its depending flange 16; except, that to insure the engagement of the door flange 19 wit-h the guiding and retaining devices. 22,y

the depending flanges23o'f thelatter are spacedY `slig .r,htly further outwardly tha-n in 'thejcase`,of-the,ange 16 on theanglebar 7 `1.24 The; gulngI ,members 22 are spaced apart a distance lsomewhat less than the width of the door, so that, when the latter is fully opened, it is engaged and retained at its lower portion by both of said devices.

The vertical edges of the door 11 are preferably bound by angle strips 211; and to the outer side of one of the posts 10 is secured a stop plate 25. To the inner side of the door adjacent to its other vertical edge is preferably attached a weather strip 26 adapted to cooperate with the front flange of the other door post 10 when the door is in fully closed position.

.The foregoing description, in connection with theV drawing, will make clear to persons skilledin the art how the vstated objects of the invention are attained by the described construction.` ,It will be seen that both of the co-operating door guiding and locking lianges 16 and 19 arel located.y inwardly of the vertical plane of the ioor of the car at the opening, whereit is impossible for them to be bent, broken, or otherwise damagedthrough contact with the lading or with trucks. It will also be noted that the fastenings 13 andv 14 of the stationary guiding and locking flange 16 are both approximately in the line of outward thrust on the. flange 16 resulting from pressure on the inner side of the door or the tendency of the door to swing outwardly under swaying movements of the car, so that there is no prying strain on saidfastenings, such as occurs in the case of brackets of the old constructionI above referredto, which are rivetked to the lower portion of the sill ata con- 3 siderable distance below the lower edge of the door. rIhe cams 2O and 2,1 act automatically to draw Vthe door snugly against the vertical posts or margins of the opening when it ris closed, and the'stop 25 and strip 26 both serve as weather strips. By extending the guiding and retaining flange 16 the full width of the door, the latter is manifestly held against outward pressure at its bottom over its entire width. Again, the door cannot be unlocked at its ,bottom by prying it upwardly and then outwardly, as has frequently been done by thieves and pilferers withthe old bracketguide construction hereinbefore referred to, nor can it be so unlocked at its bottom by internal pressure of the lading bulging the same outwardly, since upward and outward pressure ca-use the guiding and locking members 16 and 19 to, engage with each other` only the more tightly and securely.

Vhile I havey herein shown and described one practical and useful formin which the principle ofthe invention may be embodied itis manifest that changes in Vthe details ofstructure and arrangement; mayV be resorted to without involving, any departure from the, opera-tive .principle of"v the inventionor sacricinglan'y oftheadvantages inherent therein.'` Hence I do not limit the in `on said door.

2. In a car door construction, the combination with a car body having a door opening in a wall thereof, a door sill at the bottom of said opening, and a sliding door,

of a metal strip attached to the under side.

of said door sill and having a depending flange disposed inwardly of the outer edge of the latter, and a metal strip attached to said door and formed with an upstanding flange lying behind said depending flange and co-operating with the latter to hold said door against outward movement.

3. In a car door construction, the combination with a car body having a door opening in a wall thereof, a door sill at. the bottom of said opening, and a slidingdoor, of a metal strip attached to the under side of said door sill and formed with a depending flange extending the full width ofsaid door sill and disposed inwardly of the outer edge of the latter, and a metal strip Vsecured to the bottom of said door formed with a rearwardly extending horizontal portion underlying said depending flange and an upstanding flange lying behind said depending flange and co-operating with the latter to hold said door against outward movement.

4. In a car door construction, the combination with a car body having a door opening in a wall thereof, and a sliding door, of a guiding and retaining member for the bottom of said door located inwardly of the outer vertical plane of said door opening, a co-operating guiding and retaining member carried by said. door, and co-operating means on said guiding and retaining memn bers for drawing the door inwardly as it is slid to its closed position.

5. In a car door construction, the combi` nation with a car body having a door opening in a wall thereof, and a sliding door, of a metal strip attached to the car and having a depending flange disposed inwardly of the outer vertical plane of said opening, a metal strip attached to said door and formed with an upstanding flange lying behind said depending flange, and cams on the opposed faces of said flanges, respectively, each co-operating with the other flange as the door is slid to closed position, to draw the bottom of the door inwardly.

6. In a car door construction, the combination with a car body having a door opening in a wall thereof, a door sill at the bottom of said opening, and a sliding door, of a metal strip secured to and extending inwardly of the bottom of said door and formed with an upstanding flange, a metal strip attached to the under side of said door sill and having a depending flange disposed inwardly of the outer edge of said door sill and in front of said upstanding flange when the door is closed, and a plurality of spaced metal strips attached to the car at one side of said door opening and formed with depending flanges disposed in front of said upstanding flange when the door is open and co-operating with said upstanding flange to hold the open door against outward movement.

EARL F. JAGER. 

